Companies Shrug as Union Report Lambasts Frontier/Verizon
According to a report issued Thursday by the Communications Workers of America, West Virginia’s utility commission should not approve Verizon’s proposed sale of landlines to Frontier Communications. West Virginia is the only state left among 14 where Frontier wants to acquire Verizon networks in which the transaction still needs utility commission approval to proceed.
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The union’s report, entitled “Preventing a Telecommunications Disaster,” marshals general arguments against the transaction familiar from CWA fusillades of recent months and includes charges specific to West Virginia. The union argues that if the deal goes through, Frontier would own 85 percent of phone lines in the state, concentrating too much power in one company’s hands and putting not only West Virginia telecom at risk but also Frontier. In the other 13 states affected by the deal, Frontier’s holdings after the transaction would average 8 percent, the report said. The union report also repeated questions that CWA has raised in the past about Frontier’s finances, stating that the company’s revenues and profits have shrunk along with shareholder equity since the deal was announced last year.
The CWA report is the union’s “latest publicity stunt,” a Verizon official said. “There’s nothing `new’ in this report,” Verizon spokesman Harry Mitchell said in an e-mail. “CWA drags up old, disproven accusations and puts a new coating of paint on them. Verizon and Frontier have answered CWA’s countless, baseless claims at the Public Service Commission, which has before it a comprehensive record of evidence based on months of testimony, discovery by parties to the case and four days of hearings. We believe that the PSC will complete its review and conclude -- as eight other state regulators already have done -- that this transaction benefits West Virginians in numerous ways, with increased investment, increased broadband availability, job protections and a new Southeast regional headquarters in Charleston. We encourage the commission to complete that review promptly."
Frontier agreed. “These are the same old tired statements from the CWA leadership that are wrong and inaccurate which are trying to distract everyone from all the good things that will occur from this transaction,” Frontier spokesman Steven Crosby said by e-mail. “Frontier will expand broadband in the 14 states where we are purchasing Verizon lines. … Bottom line, it’s good for the local and state economies because those jobs bring in tax revenues and the expansion of broadband forwards the FCC’s vision for expanded broadband throughout the United States."
In a Thursday editorial, the State Journal, a West Virginia daily, warned utility commission members against a decision that would make that state “the lone naysayer” on the deal. The newspaper also suggested that a vote against approval would give the appearance of kowtowing to labor and other foes of the sale.